The Sutter Gould Medical Foundation broke ground today on its new, $23 million Turlock Care Center, ushering in a new era of Turlock health care.
“We're building it so we can handle the current growth in the City of Turlock and the future growth of the City of Turlock,” said Susan Pimentel, Sutter Health spokesperson.
Construction of the new care center, located at the intersection of Golden State Boulevard and Christofferson Parkway, was approved by the Sutter Health Board of Directors in November 2012. The new location will offer easy access from Highway 99, additional parking, and expanded services.
“I’m pleased that we are able to construct a new care center for the residents of Turlock and the surrounding communities,” said Paul DeChant, CEO of Sutter Gould Medical Foundation. “Providing outpatient and physician services close to home helps foster healthy communities.”
Should all go according to plan, the 37,000 square-foot building will open in the fall of 2014.
The building will replace Turlock's existing Sutter Gould office, located at 1015 E. Main St. That building has been in use since 1950, a relic of a time when medical care was very different than it is today.
“A lot has changed in the way we provide care,” Pimentel said.
The new care center will continue to offer the same sort of services found at the existing Sutter Gould office, including urgent care, family and internal medicine, pediatrics, radiology, and lab work. But the facility will also offer additional services to the Turlock region as specialists previously stationed only in Modesto will now have local office hours, saving Turlockers the drive.
“We're just very excited about the new facility and the opportunities that it provides us,” Pimentel said.
The facility is just part of Sutter Gould's expansion plans. The regional health care provider recently purchased the Eaton Medical Center Plaza in Tracy, allowing the development of a new 37,000 square foot building on the site.
The new Turlock Care Center will employ 25 to 30 physicians when it opens. And the center could grow even larger in the years to come, as Sutter Health owns an additional two acres on the site for future expansion.
